


Heart on My Sleeve

by UnspokenWords



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Artist Keith (Voltron), Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Gay Keith (Voltron), Just Broganes, Keith & Shiro (Voltron) are Siblings, Klance: Fantasy/Future, Lance has Heterochromia, M/M, Pining Keith (Voltron), Singer Lance (Voltron), Tattoo Artist Keith (Voltron), TeamKLFuture, Trans Keith (Voltron), Trans Male Keith (Voltron), background Adashi, background hunk, background pidge, broganes, it's the only thing hetero about him
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-04
Updated: 2020-04-04
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:14:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23483686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnspokenWords/pseuds/UnspokenWords
Summary: Keith has just opened up his tattoo parlor, but in an age where robots will take any image you want and print and tattoo that image perfectly, he's not getting much business. He's lucky that he was able to open the parlor in the first place, thanks to his brother's support. He's lucky that anyone was supporting him, considering Keith isn't the type to ask for help. He doesn't show his feelings often. He doesn't wear his heart on his sleeve.But when a man named Lance McClain walks into his parlor looking for a tattoo, everything changes.
Relationships: Keith & Lance (Voltron), Keith & Shiro (Voltron), Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 18
Kudos: 131
Collections: Klance: Fantasy | Future





	Heart on My Sleeve

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! This fic was done for the Twitter event, Klance: Fantasy/Future! I wrote a future prompt! [Here are the rest of the works!](https://twitter.com/i/events/1246511881499447296?s=13) We had many talented artists and writers participating, so please check them out! If you just want fics, you can check out the collection this is in! Without further ado, here is my fic!

Keith grabs his tools and washes them, scrubbing them clean. He puts them into their sanitizing container to dry and turns it on. He then washes his hands, and puts them into their sanitizer box, waiting for everything to be clean. Clean tools and clean hands mean no infections, and no infections mean more business. Keith can’t risk any business, can’t risk getting less revenue. He really wants _more_ business so he can keep doing this.

He only recently opened his tattoo parlor, and being a rookie tattoo artist with no buzz around him isn’t easy. Sure, he does have a portfolio, but that’s because of his friends who were willing to get tattoos from him. And the shop? Keith could’ve never afforded to buy it himself. He’s lucky that Shiro was willing to give him money to buy tools and supplies. Glow ink wasn’t exactly cheap, but Shiro, being the good mentor and older brother he was, believed in Keith and gave him the money to buy it. It wasn’t the first time Shiro had helped Keith with funds; in fact, Shiro had gotten the help of Keith’s friends, and they all pitched in for Keith’s top surgery years ago, but this was different. This was an affirmation of Keith’s dreams, and it was way more expensive. Since it was such a big investment, Shiro had asked Keith to give him a free tattoo.

Keith would’ve done that tattoo for him for free anyway. A glowing purple tattoo of the date Shiro beat cancer? There’s no universe in which Keith wouldn’t have done it for free. Shiro went through so much to beat it, since neither of them had the money to afford the instant treatment, and Keith was proud of him.

But, Shiro had also helped Keith by paying him to do tattoos for Keith’s friends. From tattooing Pidge’s ‘pet’ robot Rover on their wrist with glowing green, to a glowing yellow sun on Hunk’s back, to even Shiro and Adam’s anniversary on Adam’s neck, it’s been nice. And, Shiro did pay for the quicker healing treatment, so they were able to heal within 2-3 days without aftercare.

The tattoos helped widen Keith’s portfolio. But despite that, business has been slow. Keith hasn’t gotten many customers. When there are the robots that just print out photos and tattoo them now, Keith just wonders if this was a good idea.

The door opens, and Keith looks up from his drawing tablet and leans back so he can see the entrance. It’s someone with short, brown curly hair, sunglasses, and a light gray tan overcoat.

Keith gets up from his desk to go to the counter.

But, upon getting closer, Keith knows that this person isn’t the type of person who should be here. Their skin is clear, their clothes are unwrinkled without any stains, and it’s not possible for most people to have all of those. This person must have money.

While Keith is curious why someone with the money for a robot would come here, he’s happy to have a customer no matter what, even if the customer is cute and a little distracting.

Per standard protocol, before discussing with the customer, Keith has to ask for names and pronouns. He learns that this man is Lance McClain, and he’s apparently a singer. When he asks Keith if he’s heard of him, he has to answer that he hasn’t. But, the guy brushes it off, doesn’t care that he isn’t recognized, and takes off his sunglasses to hang them on his shirt.

 _Oh._ Keith likes Lance’s eyes a lot. One brown, one blue. But Keith refuses to stare, because he knows what it’s like to have people stare at you, and he doesn’t want to make Lance uncomfortable.

So, he stops staring, asks Lance what he wants for his tattoo and where he wants it, and Lance says he wants two butterflies flying away, both with blue glow ink, on his forearm and that he would prefer to get it today, but he doesn’t want to rush Keith if he can’t do it. He wants to watch Keith draw.

Now, Keith honestly doesn’t mind Lance watching him draw. It allows Lance to give him feedback faster, allows Keith to change things at Lance’s whim. If he’s got the wrong pose, he can change it. 

So, five minutes later, Keith is hunched over his drawing tablet in the corner as Lance watches. His first sketch is okay. He doesn’t really think it’s _good_ good yet, but it’s a beginning. It’s really about the basic shape and general details, and not the small things. But, it’s going well enough to ask Lance what he thinks. He adds a layer for colors and goes to add the glow bright blue to the butterflies. But Keith can’t stop thinking about Lance’s eyes, can’t stop thinking about how beautiful they are. And he knows Lance didn’t ask for it, but Keith can’t help himself. He colors one of the butterflies with the blue, and one with a non-glowing light brown.

And Keith shows it to Lance, mostly to get his approval on the overall shape and poses of the butterflies, but Lance doesn’t say anything. He just looks at it.

And Keith thinks he shouldn’t have done the two colors, that Lance is going to think he’s creepy or be mad and leave instead of letting Keith fix it, he thinks he should’ve just _listened_ to Lance—

But Lance tells him he loves it. That the poses are great, that he loves it more than he would’ve if they were both blue.

Of course, he does have a few criticisms. Lance wants the butterflies bigger, wants the blue slightly brighter, wants them to be slightly farther apart. And so Keith makes all the adjustments necessary, and once Lance approves, he gets to work on the line art.

* * *

Keith finds out very quickly after Lance leaves that he wasn’t kidding when he said he was famous. Sure, Keith had asked him about his music when he was giving Lance the tattoo, and he got some song recommendations from Lance, but he thought Lance was just a small artist.

Keith was very wrong.

Lance had posted a photo of his tattoo after it had healed with the quick healing scan, and he had tagged Keith’s tattoo parlor in that post. Since then, Keith’s communication lines had blown up. Fans of Lance were requesting tattoo appointments, and people were even just coming into the shop for photos. Because of all of this, Keith has been pretty busy.

But, Lance walks into the tattoo parlor while Keith is in the middle of a tattoo appointment, he’s not surprised that a bunch of the people there waiting for their tattoos end up screaming Lance’s name, and try to take photos with him.

Sure, maybe Keith is excited to see him too. He does want to thank Lance for the business, and just wants to talk to him more. Lance was fun to talk to. And maybe Keith wants to ask Lance why he came to this shop in the first place. And maybe Keith wants to talk to Lance about his music.

Keith did listen to some of Lance’s songs after he had left. Which lead to him listening to all of them, but he would never admit it to Lance.

But, Keith is working, and he’s not gonna let Lance distract or intimidate him.

So, he yells for him to please wait a minute, and finishes up with the person in the chair, talking with her about Lance’s music and just Lance.

She tells him about Lance and how much she admires him for supporting workers, tells Keith that her father runs a laundromat and she found out about Lance because he had gotten his clothes done there once. She talks about his boycotting of the interspecies pet breeders, about his donations of most of his wealth, about how he’s tried to help fans that are in need.

And Keith somehow finds himself falling deeper into this man.

But, he finishes up her tattoo, gives her the standard care package, and sends her off with a smile.

He then asks Lance what he’s doing here, and he says that he’s come to get another tattoo, but he’ll wait until Keith is done.

And Keith, a man who considers himself very weak when it comes to cute guys with a heart of gold, invites Lance to watch him work, so long as he isn’t too loud. He doesn’t want to get distracted from his clients.

Lance takes him up on that offer and sits in on his appointments with each client’s permission, watching the tattoo process, talking with his fans, taking photos, and singing a little. Keith really doesn’t mind one bit.

The appointments go by fast this way, but after all the time has passed, Keith is still a little surprised that Lance is still around. It’s closing hours, but Lance doesn’t seem to mind. Keith tells Lance that he’s just going to close up the store, and walks over to the wall to set the door’s display to say ‘closed’ and for it to be locked from the outside.

And then they just start talking. They talk about Lance’s music, talk about Keith’s tattoos, talk about anything that comes to mind. But Keith, Keith steers the conversation to Lance. He feels like Lance is an enigma, like he knows nothing about him.

And what Keith does know about Lance is confusing to him. He has enough money to spend on so many things, but he doesn’t. He’s got the fame to get whatever he wants, yet he comes to this shop, where the owner doesn’t know him or give him discounts. He’s got so many fans, and yet he comes back to a place he knows his fans are, instead of avoiding it to make sure he doesn’t get bombarded.

Keith needs to know this man, needs to understand the man with the blue and brown eyes. 

But Lance doesn’t let him. He changes the subject because he wants to know Keith. There isn’t much to learn about Keith, but he answers anyway. Keith answers about how he started drawing, how he became a tattoo artist, why he became a tattoo artist. He asks about his brother, his brother’s husband, and the rest of his family.

Keith has to tell Lance that his mom and dad are dead, and that he only has Shiro and his friends. He tells Lance about his tattoo of the day his parents died, tells him to not give him pity. He’s had enough of it. But Lance’s face still dropped, and he still tries to apologize for bringing it up, and Keith doesn’t want to talk about it anymore. Doesn’t want to see Lance looking like that.

So he changes the subject. He asks Lance about the tattoo he came here to get. Lance tells him he wants a seashell, a conch, on his wrist. Keith invites Lance over to his drawing station and gets to work.

* * *

Lance keeps coming back to the tattoo parlor, back to Keith, even if it’s just to chat with him after hours. It puzzles him. Keith has seen the rumors from reporters, the paparazzi, the fans. He’s seen them saying that either Lance is addicted to tattoos or there’s another reason he keeps going to the tattoo place. After all, they haven’t seen him with any new tattoos, so either he’s getting tattoos in hidden places or there for something else. Whether it’s something Keith has or Keith himself, the speculation is crazy.

But Lance keeps coming back, even if it feeds it. Keith doesn’t understand why, but he also doesn’t care. He’s happy to be friends with Lance. And to get Lance’s personal communication line. And to start hanging out with him.

One time, while hanging out with him at night, getting drunk together under the night sky, Keith’s brain makes a profound discovery. Maybe it was just a drunk discovery, but it was a discovery nonetheless. 

Lance isn’t a sun. Hunk is a sun, but Lance is not a sun. Everyone on social media calls him a sun, but he’s not. Lance is a moon. Lance shines brightly, but he doesn’t let himself outshine the others. Instead, he lifts them up, shining with the stars in the night sky. He’s humble and sweet, and his wide smile and bright eyes and the way his nose crinkles when he laughs makes Keith fall deeper. Deeper into Lance, deeper into those eyes, deeper into whatever this is.

Keith discovers that Lance is surprisingly down to earth. When he first walked into the shop, Keith would’ve never guessed it. When he got his first tattoo, he didn’t think that Lance would be this complex. 

He had gotten his first hints of it from that conversation with a fan, but he really gets the full effects when hanging out with him.

Lance just loves the natural world, the way the world is just meant to be. He has the money to live in places that slow time, to live in areas that are eternally one season, has the only to make sure that it never rains where he lives, yet he doesn’t do it.

Keith doesn’t understand why Lance wouldn’t do those things. He’s always hated summer and winter. Summer was too hot, and it put Keith in way too many shorts and he has too many scars on his legs. Winter was too cold, and his house didn’t have heaters or anything yet, so he was freezing every time it came around. It reminds him of when his parents died. So if he could just live in either spring or fall, he would in a heartbeat.

But even if he doesn’t understand it, he likes Lance’s mentality. And he likes Lance. Likes seeing him in the rain with no umbrella, likes seeing him dance and draw things in the sand of the non-artificial beach that’s 300 miles away.

But Lance doesn’t reject technology, he embraces it. He accepted the quick healing scan for his tattoos. He uses his light bike and teleporters for faster travel. His clothes never get wrinkles because of the fabric they’re made out of. 

But he won’t do anything that doesn’t support workers. He insists on hiring people to clean his house instead of getting self-cleaning. He insists on getting his clothes dry-cleaned by real people instead of just using his at-home machine all the time. He gets real tattoos from real artists instead of the printed shit from the bots.

One time, when Keith visits Lance’s house, Lance takes him out to his backyard, where he’s growing plants. He says he’s not the best at it, but he has a consultant he hires to help him and teach him. Lance shows Keith his favorite flower: blue cornflowers. Keith tells him that they’re beautiful, and Lance hands him one that he cut earlier. Keith puts it behind his ear and smiles at him. He feels warm, like the flower stem is burning his ear and burning his heart.

Out of nowhere, Lance asks Keith if he can kiss his cheek. Keith says yes, it’s not like he could’ve said no anyways. Lance kisses the scar on his face. Keith spends the rest of their time thinking about it, even as he walks home with a few flowers that Lance gave him. When Keith gets home, he feels Lance’s lips on his scar as if they’ve never left.

He wishes the seasons would never change, wishes that Lance will never grow bored of him and throw him aside, but he can’t afford to live in an area where time will stop. He can’t afford to slow the passage of time, even with the increased business.

But somehow, Lance makes him feel like he can. When he’s with him, everything starts and everything stops, including his heart.

Keith asks Shiro if he has any time-cases, and Shiro gives him one. Keith uses them for his flowers, keeps them in a vase on his dinner table under the case. It’s small, but it’s all he can do. He wants this to stay.

This is how Keith realizes he’s in love.

* * *

Lance stops by pretty often now. So often that Keith has given Lance his own key. And so, the next time Lance walks into the tattoo parlor without any warning, it’s after hours, using his key. Keith isn’t surprised that he’s here, since he _did_ give him the key, but he’s happy that Lance came after hours, instead of causing a ruckus like he tends to do. While Keith doesn’t mind when Lance comes over during open hours, since he always brings snacks and interacts with any fans there, Keith doesn’t need to be distracted by him all the time.

But, even though Lance came at a good time of the day, it doesn’t mean that he’s come at a good time for Keith. In fact, it’s a bad time for Keith. Keith is in the middle of giving himself a tattoo. Well, he’s not in the middle, in fact, he’s almost done, but the point still stands. Keith is using his tattoo machine on his arm, which is numb because Keith used numbing cream. He doesn’t want to flinch and ruin his tattoo, so that’s what he’s doing.

Despite being a tattoo artist, Keith wouldn’t say that he has that many tattoos. He does have some, most of which he did himself, but he doesn’t have many. He only has tattoos for the things he wants to remember. Like the date that his parents died tattooed right above his ankle. Like the semicolon tattooed on his wrist. Like the knife his mom gave him tattooed on his calf. Like the color wheel that’s made up of a rainbow flag on one side, and a trans flag on the other, tattooed on the back of his neck.

Like the tattoo he’s doing right now. It’s a heart made of blue cornflowers. Now, Keith isn’t the type of person who wears his heart on his sleeve. He’s not very expressive, and most people get confused about how he feels. But right now, he is, both literally and figuratively. Keith is showing everyone that he wants to remember this. He wants to remember those flowers, wants to remember Lance, wants to remember that kiss on his scar.

Even if Lance ends up leaving.

But Lance isn’t leaving yet, he’s here right now, and he’s humming a song Keith hasn’t heard before, but it sounds like something he would write. And he turns to look at Keith giving himself his tattoo and their eyes meet. But Keith needs to finish, he can’t let himself be distracted by him, he needs to finish this tattoo and he’s almost done, so he breaks eye contact and gets back to work.

Surprisingly, Lance doesn’t talk. He usually does, but he doesn’t. He just sings under his breath, correcting himself, like he’s writing a song right now. Keith guesses that he was right that it was his song. Keith finishes up with Lance’s song in the background, finishes the blue normal ink in the flowers, cleans up the tattoo. He gives himself a quick healing scan, and grabs his tools and washes them, scrubbing them clean. washes his hands, and puts them into their sanitizer box, waiting for everything to be clean. 

Lance finally speaks up, asking him what the tattoo is of. As if it’s not obvious, as if Lance can’t see what it is. As if he doesn’t recognize his own favorite flower. Keith responds back, asking him to guess.

Lance is quiet again. They’re making eye contact again. Keith is looking into his eyes, and Lance is looking back, and he’s not saying a word, but then suddenly, Lance is moving closer to Keith until he’s right in front of him. Keith thinks he must’ve made a mistake, that Lance is going to leave him and give Keith back his key.

And then suddenly, he’s asking Keith if he can kiss him, and Keith was not expecting it, but he also can’t wait anymore. He leans in and kisses Lance instead, and everything feels right. Lance kisses him back, grabbing his face, pulling him in. Keith runs his hands through Lance’s hair, and everything just feels right. Lance kisses Keith like a tide coming into shore, like he’s everything he’s ever been looking for and more, like Keith is a harmony that he’s been playing in his soul but he’s never been able to find. 

And when they separate, which they do as they both need to breathe, Keith looks Lance into his eyes, one blue and one brown, and asks if Lance will be his boyfriend. Keith hopes that he hasn’t read Lance wrong, that Lance doesn’t just want someone to kiss but wants Keith as a whole.

Lance responds that he would want nothing more.

Later, after they talk through boundaries, and kiss some more, and they head to Lance’s house just for cuddles, Keith asks him about the song he was singing. Lance is sitting on the bed, guitar in his hand, and asks if he wants to hear it, and of course Keith does. So, Lance starts to sing it, and Keith can’t help but fall deeper into the man he’s already in love with.

When he’s done, Lance asks if he likes it, and when Keith says yes, Lance asks if he wants to hear a secret.

The song is about Keith.

Keith runs over to kiss Lance, and in his mind, he thinks that he can’t wait for Lance to meet his family. To meet Shiro and Adam, and Pidge, and Hunk. To go with him to pay respects to Keith’s parents.

Keith looks into the eyes that started it all, and everything feels right. With his heart on his sleeve, he thinks he’s flying high. Maybe they’re the butterflies.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I tried something new here with writing without dialogue, so I hope you liked it! I wanted to do a future AU but didn't just want to focus on the future aspect, rather have it be in the background of everything that was happening. I hope you all found it to be interesting! In notes on other characters, Romelle and Allura are actually friends with Lance, so Keith doesn't speak about them through the fic.
> 
> Again, please check out the rest of the works for Klance: Fantasy/Future [here!](https://twitter.com/i/events/1246511881499447296?s=13) Everyone worked really hard on this, so I would really appreciate it. And, if you want to talk about the event on Twitter, you can use "#KlanceFantasyFuture" and "#TeamKLFantasy" and "#TeamKLFuture"!
> 
> If you enjoyed this or if you didn't, please leave a comment below! Or, find me on Twitter! I do also have a Tumblr, but I use Twitter more often.
> 
> Twitter: [@_keithtrash_](https://twitter.com/_keithtrash_)
> 
> And, if you like my content, you can find my Ko-fi link on my [Carrd](https://keithtrash.carrd.co). Just press the cup with a heart on the buttons on the bottom!


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